


The Morning Will Come When The World Is Mine

by Master_Of_Ceremonies



Category: Cabaret - Fandom, Hetalia - Fandom
Genre: Bisexual disaster Gilbert Beilschmidt, Cabaret AU, Elizaveta and Roderich are Herr Shultz and Frau Shneider, F/F, F/M, Feli is Sally, Historical Hetalia, Human AU, M/M, Multi, Now beta read!, Period Typical Homophobia, Period Typical Transphobia, Some have been tweaked for plot reasons, The nationalities of the characters don’t match their nationverse nationalities, World War Two, be gay wear garters punch nazis, everything hurts and nothing goes well!, gilbert is the master of ceremonies, ludwig is clifford, mentioned prostitution, oh lord almighty this is gonna be a BEAST of a thing, the mood of this varies between horny and deeply disturbing, this will basically follow the plot of cabaret with some tweaks, trans Feliciano, trans Feliks, trigger warning for Nazis being nazis
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-21
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:47:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21879856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Master_Of_Ceremonies/pseuds/Master_Of_Ceremonies
Summary: “There was a cabaret,And there was a master of ceremonies,In a city called Berlin,In a country called Germany,And it was the end of the world,And I was dancing with Feliciano Vargas,And we were both fast asleep.”
Relationships: Austria/Hungary, Germany/Italy, Various Background Relationships, prussia/literally everyone
Comments: 6
Kudos: 6





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Well, here we at last. I’ve been working on this beast for a while now and I’m pretty proud of how it turned out. 
> 
> This is a cabaret au, so I highly recommend listening to the corresponding songs while reading each chapter. I also have a bootleg I’m willing to dm folks if you wanna check out the actual choreography ;)
> 
> The nationalities and alligences of the characters were chosen to make sense within the plot, so they don’t really line up with canon. Yea, I know it’s kind of confusing. Please bear with me.
> 
> This is more of a prologue than first chapter, but please enjoy! Chapter one should come out by the end of the weekend and updates will be weekly if all goes to plan.

Somewhere in Berlin, a band plays. The city is quiet tonight, the rain having chased anyone with half a steady mind indoors. The urchins and poor have scuttled into darker, warmer corners to hide for the night. One such corner is the Kit Kat Klub. Damp, sordid, a hidden paradise. Here, both the scum of the earth and business men drop their pretenses and laugh. It’s not a fancy place, crawling with whores and homosexuals and ever present cigarette smoke. Every good city needs spots like this, places that smell of cheap gin and sweat and half soured perfume. Like a hazy dreamland, the club welcomes the outsiders of Berlin into its belly. 

This is not any club for dancing, no, this is a Cabaret. Cabaret is all the misfits of Berlin, singing and dancing and fucking and mourning for the country they once knew. The good people of Berlin tolerate it; some even partake in the revels on occasion. After all, sometimes all one needs to loosen up is a good night at the Cabaret. The Kit Kat Klub is a vile vaccine, a circus that the freaks built for themselves.

Men in satin dresses sit on the laps of businessmen and waiters alike, as two slim boys crush their lips together with all the urgency and folly of youth in the corner. A woman in coattails takes the cigarette from the mouth of the woman beside her, smirking. There is a whole table of what appears to be grandmothers (cabaret has always been strikingly popular with grandmothers). Everyone, no matter age or gender, is drinking. This is Cabaret. This is Berlin. 

Ah, but we’ve tarried on too long. The show is starting. 

A bright spotlight illuminates the stage! The horns, old and off tune, begin their waltz! The curtain, patched and worn, is parted! It reveals… nothing. A mumble arises from the crowd, some knaves in the front jeering. The spotlight frantically searches through the audience to find its target and- ah! A single high heel foot sticks in the air. It is followed by a leg, a torso, a man! Or perhaps not. These days, it is exceedingly hard (and rude) to try and determine the gender of strangers. But for narrative purposes I will reassure you that he is a man, if quite an odd one. 

He sits on some stranger’s lap, caught in the middle of a passionate kiss. Was this planned? Uncertain. He detangles himself, looking quite pleased in how things seem to be going tonight. A slender hand readjusts his white hair, red eyes twinkling with mischief as he peers into the audience. He smirks, and begins his song. 

He dances to the music, accenting the words with gestures and swishes of his hips. He sings in a triplet, German-French-English. He doesn’t have the nicest voice ever. It is rough from a life of screaming and smoking, yet surprisingly enjoyable to listen to. As he finishes the first verse, as if to truly welcome his audience, he whips off the elegant robe to reveal garters and stockings and not much else. 

“Meine Damen Und Here, mesdames et messieurs, Ladies…and gentlemen,” He purrs the last word, winking at the audience. He speaks with a heavy not quite german accent, a dialect perhaps? It does not matter. “Guten abend, Bonsoir, Good evening!” He seems so childishly thrilled to be on stage, practically glowing under the spotlight. His feral smile, his violently rouged cheeks and lips, his mascared eyes, the way his tongue flits out between his teeth suggestively. It’s impossible to look away. He’s just that awesome and handsome. 

“Vie gest, comma ceva, do you feel good? Ja, I bet you do!” He winks, “Ich bin ein confrencer, ju cuanto confer, I am your host!” 

He is the master of ceremonies, his name is Gilbert, and he is grabbing at his own crotch. Welcome to Cabaret. 

He slinks across the stage, repeating the chorus one more time in case the audience had not figured out they were, in fact, in a cabaret. 

“Leave your troubles outside! We have no troubles here!” This is a boldface lie. Trouble was lurking outside the doors of the cabaret, on the fingertips of the men in suits, in the smile of his manager offstage. Really, what he should be saying is we can forget our troubles here. Here, the scum are celebrated, if only for a couple of hours. Here, all that matters is rouged nipples and cheeky smiles. “Here, life is beautiful! The girls are beautiful! Even the orchestra is beautiful!” 

As if to prove this, the music swells. The orchestra is showing off, especially Alfred on percussion. That kid needs to chill out and also maybe do less drugs. The audience hoots and hollers, possibly for the musical prowess of this ramshackle band and possibly for the fact they are scantily clothed. With this type of crowd, there really is no way to tell. 

“See, I told you the orchestra was beautiful!” Somewhere in the last thirty seconds Gilbert has managed to find himself a cigarette. There’s something in the way he places it in his mouth that makes you think he likely plucked it from the lips of some unsuspecting audience member. The crowd claps politely. They know now is the moment they all came for. “And now, presenting the cabaret girls!”

He gestures to the side of the stage, and several barely clothed women slink from both offstage and audience member’s laps. Though the girls look almost nothing alike, being from all different backgrounds and nationalities, they all share the same hungry look in their eyes. Their makeup is cheap and haphazard, but under the dim lights of the cabaret they could almost pass for angels. Each is introduced with a flick of his wrist and a hopeless joke. One of the girls (for tonight at least, Francis liked to switch up which costume he wore) embraces him, pulling him to the front to dance raunchily together. She whispers something in his ear, and he laughs silently. A private moment, on display for all the leering eyes in the audience. Francis is the reason Gilbert entered this line of business in the first place, after all.

The band has no time for personal asides, and the music continues on. The boys are introduced now, with the same bombastic vigor as the girls. That, and several more dick jokes. Gilbert can’t help himself, and the audience howls along. The girls and Gilbert writhe around each other, touching themselves and each other. Bending and dipping, He spins, peering out at the audience from under his snow white bangs.

And soon the song reaches its climax, along with several overeager audience members, and the dancing reaches a frenzy. Gilbert seems to be attempting to make the record for the most suggestive gestures one can make in a minute, groping at Amelia one second and licking Antonio’s face the next. At last, the final crash of drums, the final kick of a leg. Gilbert is hoisted onto the other preformer’s shoulders. Chest’s heaving, they bask in the applause.

The lights are bright, the patrons are ready, the story has begun.


	2. SO WHAT?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “If it ended like that, then it ended like that! And I shrug and I say so what!”
> 
> In which Ludwig is seduced by a city of ghosts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ao3 fucked my formatting anyone know how to make it recognize italics

A train carves its way through the German countryside, gently rocking Ludwig Beilschmidt in its bowels. He holds a pen loosely in one hand, bouncing it idly against his notebook with a gentle tap tap tap. The hills roll by outside the window of Ludwig’s compartment, and he stares at his reflection in the glass. Slicked back hair, square jaw, the picture of confidence. Ready to find himself in the land of his childhood. He slips the notebook back into the pocket of his jacket. It’s not like he was getting any writing done. He’d chased inspiration all across Europe to no avail, but he had a good feeling about this time. A novel awaited him in Berlin.

“Sind est frei?” a voice shakes him from his thoughts. He looks up, meeting the eyes of a bespeckled man.  
“Ja… bitte.” He gestures to the seat across from him.  
“American?” The man sits, laying his suitcase down on the floor.  
“I might as well wear a sign,” Ludwig huffs. He had been hoping his german accent would be convincing. Though he barely had any memories from before his father had moved with him to America, he had spent his life studying the culture of his homeland. “Yankee doodle.”  
“I am Eduard. Eduard Von Bock. Berlin.” They shake hands. Eduard has a firm handshake and a flighty smile, eyes that dart around the train even as he introduces himself.  
“Ludwig Beilschmidt. Harrisburg Pennsylvania. I give english lessons.” Ludwig’s tone is apologetic, embarrassed. He waits for the man - Eduard - to ask where that is, but his attention has already been stolen away. He stares out the window, something unreadable in his eyes. Mouth set in a determined line. Ludwig takes a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, lighting one for himself and offering one to Eduard in one smooth motion. Before Eduard can open his mouth to decline, the two men are interrupted by the door of the compartment opening once again.

“Deutsche Grez Kontrolle, Ihre passe bitte.” The customs officer is spiffy, his uniform immaculate and neatly pressed. Ludwig reaches into his coat once more, presenting his passport for inspection. The officer barely glances at it, quickly marking both Ludwig and his luggage as safe without a second thought. He moves on to Eduard, asking him questions in German too rapid for Ludwig to understand. As the officer moves to look through Eduard’s suitcase, he smoothly lifts his briefcase from under his seat and places it next to Ludwig’s already cleared bags. Ludwig raises one eyebrow. He had never been one for rule breaking, but Eduard seemed innocent enough. Besides, it was the custom’s officer’s own fault for being so negligent. As the custom’s officer leaves Eduard visibly deflates, breathing a heavy sigh of relief. One hand goes to polish his wire spectacles, the other retrieves the contraband briefcase. 

“What’s in the bag?” Ludwig regards him with a mixture of disapproval and mild amusement. Eduard immediately stiffens again, a guilty smile spreading across his pale face.  
“Baubles from paris. Stockings, perfumes… but more than is permitted.” Ludwig nods in understanding. The trade sanctions after the great war were especially harsh for the Germans. Eduard, clearly relieved, leans forward to take Ludwig’s hand and shake it furiously.  
“You are most understanding! I will thank you very much!” Eduard’s smile turns shrewd, as if he were about to share with Ludwig a great secret. “You have been before to Berlin?”  
“Not since I was a baby.”  
“Then I will see to it that the city opens its arms to you! We begin tonight, New Year's eve! The Kit Kat Klub! This is hottest spot in the city! Telephones on every table. Girls call you!” He elbows Ludwig with a charming smile, winking. At Ludwig’s lack of reaction, he reconsiders. “...Boys call you! Or you call them! Instant connection.” He wiggles his eyebrows, his meaning evident. Ludwig flushes.  
“Thanks... but I’ve still got to find a room…”  
“You have no room! But this is no problem!” Eduard seems more thrilled with ever instant that goes by. He takes a business card from his pocket, scribbling an address on the back. “I know the finest residence in all of Berlin. Just tell Frauline Hedervary that Eduard Von Bock sent you.”  
“Oh, I can’t afford the finest residence in Berlin. I need something inexpensive.”  
“But it is inexpensive! Very inexpensive!”  
“I don’t care if it’s awful.” Ludwig runs a hand through his hair, overwhelmed at Eduard’s enthusiasm.  
“But this is awful! You will love it!” And with that, Ludwig has run out of reasons to say no. Eduard presses the card into his hand, and Ludwig inspects the man’s neat handwriting. Frauline Hedervary, huh?  
“You see! You see!” Eduard is elated as Ludwig throws aside his better judgment and decides to trust this eccentric man that he met on a train. “You have a new friend, Eduard Von Bock! You have a fine place to stay! And you are having perhaps even your first English pupil! So welcome to Berlin, my friend. Welcome to Berlin.”

~

_  
_

Across the city, a man with Ludwig’s sharp jawline mouths the same words to no one in particular. He spreads khol around his ruby red eyes and hums a little tune. 

Willkommen, buievenue, welcome  
Fremde, Entrange, Stranger  
Glucklich tu sehen, je suis enchanté  
Happy to see you!  
Bleibe, resten, stay…

~  
Fraulein Hedervary turned out to be a charming woman of middling age with a smile as sharp as her wit. The rooms she rented out were nice -- almost too nice -- just as Eduard had promised. The building seemed to be teeming with life, all sorts of strange people swarming around the hallways that Fraulein Hedervary led Ludwig through. One of whom was quite clearly running a brothel from her little room, though to Ludwig’s amusement Fraulein Hedevery simply yelled a little in the woman’s general direction before apologizing profusely to him. Yes, he definitely could write a novel here. She also, much to the dismay of our stiff shouldered friend, was a master haggler and seemed quite unconvinced by Ludwig’s claims of poverty.

“But you will give english lessons!” She urges, straightening a vase a prior tenant had meddled with. “You will have many pupils. And they will pay you, and you will pay me! Ja?”  
Ludwig blinks. He did not think it would be quite so easy, and wondered at the woman’s steadfast belief in his ability to find students. “ I can still only afford fifty marks. I don’t care how small, how far away from the bathroom…”  
“Bah!” Elizaveta, for that is her first name, threw her hands in the air. “But for a professor! This is far more suitable.”  
“I’m not a professor. Think of me as… a starving author. What do you have for a starving author?”  
“An author… a poet! You have the look.” Ludwig most certainly did not have the look.  
“...a novelist.” Was he a novelist? No novel of his had ever been completed, much less published.  
“A novelist! And you will be quite famous!” Elizaveta was undeterred in her enthusiasm, and continued on. “Such a desirable window for a novelist…  
“I can still only afford fifty marks.”  
“This room is worth one hundred. More than one hundred.” Elizaveta rubs at her forehead, a long suffering sigh escaping her lips. Looking back up at Ludwig, she can’t help the twinge of motherly affection that blossoms deep within her. “Fifty?” He nods. Well. She never was a good businesswoman. “...you say fifty marks, I say a hundred marks. A difference of fifty marks. Why should that stand in our way? As long as I'm renting the room out, the fifty I get from you is fifty more than I was getting yesterday. So who cares? The room is yours.” 

She leads him over to the desk, firmly pressing on Ludwig’s shoulder in order to get him to sit. Soon he finds himself fully engrossed in intricate tales of Elizaveta’s childhood, the woman gesturing wildly with her hands as she talks of the hijinks of yesteryear. Her philosophy of nonchalance was fascinating to Ludwig, who was a chronic perfectionist and avid worrier. The fact that she was even willing to lend the room for half its price was nothing more than a miracle. Just as Elizaveta launched into a story about a mansion she had once cleaned (and thieved blind), there was a sharp knock on the door.

A daintily clothed man entered the room, his hand wrapped around a bottle of schnapps. This dandy in a blue overcoat did not look the type to drink, Ludwig noted, and he was right. Roderich Edelstein was most definitely not the type to drink. Elizaveta, however, very much was and Roderich had learned it was a surefire way to inconspicuously invite her over. Tonight was New Years, after all. 

“Herr Edelstein!” Elizaveta’s face lights up at his entrance. “I did not realize how late it was. I was just showing Herr Beilschmidt his room, I must’ve lost track of the time. Herr Beilschmidt, Herr Edelstein. He lives down the hall, and was kind enough to invite me over for some schnapps.” The two men clasp hands, Roderich’s lips stretching a wan smile.  
“And a little fruit.” He was a fruit seller, after all. His cozy store sat on the other side of the Nollendorfplotz, the last of the few shops that sold fresh produce. “Perhaps Herr Beilscmidt..?”  
“Oh no.” He would clearly only be intruding. “Thank you.”  
“Another time then.” It is impossible to tell if Roderich is sincere, or just extremely polite. “I wish you much mazel in the new year!”  
“Mazel?” The word is strange, more guttural than german. Ludwig rolls it around in his mouth, puzzled.  
“Yiddish.” Roderich’s smile widens, always pleased when he knew something other’s did not. “It means luck. I will go now. Welcome to Berlin!” 

__

Welcome to Berlin.

Arm in arm, the two depart from Ludwig’s room, leaving him alone with his suitcase and his typewriter. He stretches, blinking a couple of times before leaning down to insert a fresh piece of paper to write on. “Welcome to Berlin, famous novelist.” he mutters to himself, glaring accusingly at the blank page. As if this sole sheet of paper were responsible for years of writer’s block and frustrated ambitions.  
“Hello.” A ghostly aberration, curly hair and baby blue eyes. Hands ghost to touch Ludwig’s face, he can almost hear her thick New York accent whispering in his ear.

Ludwig rubs his eyes, trying to clear his head. The typewriter. His novel. This is what he came here for. 

_  
_

“Standing all alone like that, you’ve caught my attention.”

Eduard’s words of clubs and dancing come back to him unbidden.

_  
_

“Would you like to buy a girl a drink?”

<\i>

And that’s enough to snap him out of the fantasy.

_  
_

“Would you like to buy a boy a drink?” <\i> And now the illusion has changed to a man with tan skin and a kind smile, and Ludwig curses his traitorous mind. 

__

Welcome to Berlin, famous novelist…. 

Ludwig slams the typewriter shut and storms from the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Almost every major character is now in play! Sorry Roderich, I was a little mean this chapter.
> 
> I am literally begging you people to comment p l e a s e

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are appreciated and moderated, so tell me your secrets ;)


End file.
